JUDGMENT

KULDIP SINGH, J —Special leave granted.

2. The respondent was working as Assistant Manager (Depot) with the Food Corporation of India. He was charge-sheeted on March 3, 1987 and disciplinary proceedings were initiated against him. The Inquiry Officer found the charges proved against him and as a consequence the disciplinary authority by the order dated September 29, 1988 dismissed the respondent from service. He challenged the order of dismissal before the High Court on the following three grounds:

(1) There has been violation of the principles of natural justice. The Inquiry Officer and the punishing authority being different he was entitled to a copy of the inquiry report before imposing the punishment of dismissal.

(2) The inquiry report was based on extraneous material. Maitheys report which finds mention in the charge-sheet was neither brought on the record nor copy of the same was given to him. The said report was not even placed before the appellate authority or the High Court.

(3) Copies of the relevant documents and material asked for by him, which were relevant for the defence, were not supplied. The action was arbitrary and violative of Article 14 of the Constitution of India.

3. Relying upon the judgment of this Court in Union of India v. Mohd. Ramzan Khan (1991) 1 SCC 588 the High Court allowed the writ petition and set aside the order of dismissal on the short ground that the copy of the inquiry report was not supplied to the respondent.

4. It was brought to the notice of the High Court that the law laid down by this Court in Mohd. Ramzan case, (1991) 1 SCC 588 was operative prospectively and the order dismissing the respondent being prior in date to the judgment in Mohd. Ramzan case(1991) 1 SCC 588, he was not entitled to take advantage of the law laid down in the said judgment. The High Court rejected the contention on the following reasoning:

The aforesaid observation of the Supreme Court does not go to the extent of depriving a person his valuable right of continuing the proceedings in court that the principle of natural justice, which is a law declared by the Supreme Court and also enshrined in Article 14 of the Constitution, has been violated. The only object, as appears, is that the closed chapter may not be reopened. If a person has not acquiesced in the order impugned, or the court has given a verdict upholding his dismissal, or the person has lost his right to approach the court, in such events, the said decision would not be applicable and the prospectivity is (sic in) considering these aspects that the controversies which have been buried, may not come out of the grave."

We do not agree with the reasoning of the High Court. This Court having specifically made the ratio in Mohd. Ramzan case, (1991) 1 SCC 588 operative prospectively there was no scope for the High Court to have applied the same to the facts of the present case.

5. We, therefore, allow the appeal, set aside the judgment of the High Court to the extent indicated above and remand the case to the High Court for decision on the other two points which were raised before the High Court but not decided. No costs.

For Citation:  1993(2) SCC 400